Camping in Populous is a tactic used mostly for when you are losing a game, or having trouble: but not only. There are more than one definition for camping, but overall, camping is when:

 

- You take advantage of high ground (or towers) to light the enemy shaman, making him not able to atack you, at at least making it harder, because you have a better shot at killing his shaman, since you have more range than him.

 

Surely, many people use this with or without intention, but is it a good tactic, or a lame one? The opinions are many, but generally, it's annoying to play against a camper, because:

 

- You want to atack their settlement, but you know their shaman might kill you with the improved range.

 

- Making it risky to atack, since if you die, the camper will have more time to expand or atack you.

 

- Darn it, it's just annoying to play against abusive campers.

 

Still, its a valid tactic - and actually a smart one. If you are losing hard, why would you atack and risk dying? Wouldn't it be better to just sit in a tower while your population grows back? But maybe you are just afraid of being called a "camper"...well, don't be, there are lamer tactics, and the enemy should blame himself because he is probably winning and can't finish you because you camp... Well, there are counters to camping, everyone should know:

 

- Ghost army might be one, even if not always effective, since enemy ghosts and swarms will kill your ghosts. Also, sending real braves and some troops will kill the ghosts.

 

- Sidedooring or backdooring. Specially if the place you backdoor makes it imposible for the enemy to camp. On the other hand, since you are winning the game, but the enemy is delaying your win by camping, once you backdoor, you can send the shaman by one side, and troops by the other.

 

- Doubling the other enemy. If you are victim of hard camp, just make your calculations. If the camper is not that dangerous, just go doubling the other opponent, forcing the camper to leave his position. Make sure to get some defense in case the camper atacks you and/or the doubling goes wrong.

 

There are other types of camping, like the CoR camping (having many firewarriors near the enemy's reincarnation site, so that when she reincarnates, she gets shot to death), or even more.

 

 

 

Let's now take a look at a 2009's post by the user "Keith52" in the PopRE forums, where he talks about his camping, and about how some people react to it.

 

Link to the post here.